


PLAYDATE

by therearethingsineed



Category: Shameless (TV), Shameless (US)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-31
Updated: 2013-03-31
Packaged: 2017-12-07 02:35:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/743195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/therearethingsineed/pseuds/therearethingsineed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mickey meets Liam. Ian's POV.</p>
            </blockquote>





	PLAYDATE

I’m not going to lie, I was really nervous at first.

Anyone who had spent any time in the Gallagher household eventually met Liam. And Liam, being roughly twelve shades darker than the rest of us, stood out a little.

Basically, he’s black, and we’re white. He’s blood, though, so we just accepted his genes with a shrug and minimal fussing. 

The Milkovich family was a little different.

It wasn’t an exaggeration to say that Terry Milkovich had created a hostile environment for his kids to grow up in. Then again, that characterized most of the south Chicago area. In my opinion, however, they took the cake. I had never heard so many creative racial puns in one household before. They were ignorant, and racist.

Thing is, though, I kind of really, really liked Mickey. Like, a lot. And when you feel that way about someone, you don’t want to hide it. You want to share it. I couldn’t, because Mickey wouldn’t have looked at me ever again, but I could do the next best thing; share my interests. Hobbies, bands, clothes. We played a continual game of catch with different movies and CDs. It was a way of making us closer without ever having to say anything. “I think you’d like this band” is easier to say than “We’re really similar, and I like that”.

Mickey wasn’t like his parents, though outwardly, he seemed like he was. How do I know this? Well, you’d be surprised what you find out about someone when you hand them a baby and step back to watch. I learned more about Mickey Milkovich that day than I had in the countless years I had known him.

He’d stopped by my house so that we could walk to work together. It was a Saturday, I think— autumn, so it was just a little cold. He and I traded clothing with unsettling ease; half of his wardrobe was shoved into my dresser drawers, as was mine with his. He was standing outside the front door, a cigarette dangling from his lips and danger in his eyes.

The morning had been going slow. Carl had caught the flu and Jimmy and FIona were fighting again, so she was stressed (meaning the whole house was stressed). It had slipped my mind that I had even had work, so when I answered the impatient knock at the door, I was momentarily stunned.

“C’mon, faggot. We’re gonna be late.” He jerked his head towards the direction of the street, but I was stuck. Fiona was running Carl to the UC, Lip had taken Debbie to school, and I was home alone, watching Liam. Shit. “Uh, I’m almost ready,” I stalled, moving away from the door. In our neighborhood, you didn’t need a strict invitation to enter a home. If the door wasn’t locked, it was as good as an open door. As it was, my door was, in fact, open, and he stepped inside with relative ease.

Mickey’s memories of my home were likely all negative, which I hated thinking about. He’d been inside only three times before; twice, once looking for me and once for my father, and then when Lloyd was digging a bullet out of his ass. He looked uncomfortable, but then again, he almost always did.

I jogged back into the kitchen, pulling out the land line and dialing the cell’s number. Fiona had it today, and seeing as she had been gone for nearly two hours, I was hoping she was done with Urgent Care and was on her way home with Carl. If only I was so lucky.

“Sorry kiddo,” She said, voice raspy from tiredness, “We’re next up, I think. The appointment shouldn’t take more than ten or fifteen minutes. We’ll be home in a half hour, hour tops.” I nodded, though she couldn’t see it. Murmuring thanks, I hung up and returned to the living room.

Mickey was standing with his hands in his pockets, staring at the photos on our mantle. “How’d you get Lip to pose for this?” He asked, gesturing to a photo of my older brother holding a certificate of some sort and smiling.

I shrugged, “Probably a joke photo.”

Mickey nodded.

“Hey, look,” I started, moving for the cavity under the stairs. Liam was napping. “I’m going to be late, but you don’t have to be.”

Mickey grunted, a noise he used for most positive and negative responses. “Like hell. What the fuck would I do there? I can’t work the register, Firecrotch,” He could, but what Mickey wasn’t saying was that he didn’t want to. I just smiled.

“Alright.”

We stood in silence for a moment, me poking at Liam, Mickey staring at photos. I was dead tired, but I didn’t want to disappoint Mickey if he wanted to have sex or something. I probably could scrounge the energy for that any time.

He didn’t seem rushed, though. Mickey wasn’t one to hide it when he felt the need, so I simply stayed by the little pen Liam slept in. The toddler was rousing, and stressed as I was, it was kind of relaxing to watch him squirm and fart and wriggle around. At least someone wasn’t freaking out around this place.

“Why’s he black?”

Turning, I found Mickey hovering a foot away, staring into the pen with constrained curiosity. He craned his neck to get a better view of the pudgy mass of child inside, still looking vaguely weirded out.

I shrugged in response to his question. “He’s Frank’s. Some kind of recessive gene shit.” It was actually me that was the bastard of the family, but it wasn’t like I wanted that advertised. “He’s a Gallagher, one-hundred percent.”

Mickey grunted again, inching closer. I wondered if he’d ever been in contact with an actual baby before. The Milkovich family was massive, but I didn’t know what their protocol was when it came to children.

We watched the little boy draw himself up, stumbling around the pen in sleepy-minded stupor. He was murmuring about toys, or boys. In our house, both are fair game.

He caught sight of me and smiled, all five of his teeth shining. In a few years they’d fall out due to sugar rot and age, but for now they were white and sharp and hard as rocks. His clumsy little hand picked up his shirt collar and brought it up to be gnawed on, while the rest of him stamped over to me. “Hey, lil guy.”

Now, there’s no easy way to put this, but Mickey was and had, for as long as I had known him, always been very racist. I didn’t think he’d hurt Liam or anything, but it was definitely a little put-off by the oddly colored child. Still, something in me wanted to know what he would do. Would he reject a baby, just because of its skin tone? Or would he reject it because it was a baby and he didn’t know how to handle it? Would he like the baby?

Picking Liam up, I turned to Mickey. Bouncing the child, I murmured, “Say hi, Liam. Say hi.” I watched his cherubic face, with its smooth skin and blank expression. He turned to look at Mickey, bedecked in a torn tee shirt, my sweater and cut-offs. He wore a chain around his neck, and nursed a cut lip. To anyone who didn’t know him, he looked pretty worse for wear. 

Liam was a barely out of infancy, though, and hadn’t yet made those associations. So we both stood still as the child analyzed this new guest in his home. Mickey’s eyes were darting nervously around, mouth pressed in a tight line.

“Bwack,” Liam spat, smiling.

“Wha— Bwack?” Mickey mouthed at me, as if saying the word aloud would cast some kind of curse over us. I started laughing, nodding.

“Is his hair black, Liam?” I asked the child. A look of understanding dawned over Mickey’s face, and I held my breath when the child in my arms reached out a hand. Time to do or die.

Mickey, seemed confused for a moment, but took a step forward, cautiously lowering his head. I was grinning at this point, because I’m sure that Mickey was freaking the fuck out, but he was trying. He was trying.

Liam buried his fingers in the gelled mass of dark hair, giggling aloud. He slapped the coif, bouncing restlessly in my arms. He didn’t yank on it, fortunately, just made curious pokes and pats. He was leaning forward, away from me and towards Mickey. After a moment I asked, “Do you want to hold him?”

Mickey’s head shot up, and Liam made a dismayed sound. If you need a picture of the Mickey’s face, it was reminiscent of how one might look if they were asked to solve a math equation they didn’t understand. Like, what the fuck do you want me to— how do i do— what? Ever entertained by the byplay, I just laughed. “C’mon, it’s easy. He likes you.”

The last statement seemed to be his undoing, because after a pregnant pause, Mickey plucked the child away from me. There was nothing cautious or delicate about the way he held Liam; it was almost as if he wanted the child to protest. Liam, however, wasn’t a normal baby. Rough-handling was pretty standard for him, so he just grin and waved his fat little arms in the air. When he saw that the child wasn’t going to give up so easily, Mickey sighed, and pulled him in. Holding him in an awkward interpretation of what I had been doing, he glanced furtively at me. “What the fuck do I do now?”

I shrugged, mouth sore from smiling. Liam reached up for Mickey’s hair, resting his head on the older boy’s shoulder. “Bwack,” he murmured contentedly, pawing at the baby hairs at the back of Mickey’s neck. 

At this point, I was feeling ridiculously satisfied with myself. I had seemingly introduced a Milkovich to his first baby. What an experience.

We stood there until Mickey began to relax, holding the child with less tension and more tenderness. I watched, ignoring the blatant discomfort Mickey was radiating. This was good for him, I thought.

I left after a bit to retrieve my work apron from my room, and when I returned, I found Mickey sitting on the couch, pushing Liam onto the cushions. Both were smiling. Liam would stand up and waddle over the padded surface towards Mickey, who would then push him lightly on the stomach, sending him back into the mass of pillows and sofa. From the stairs, I watched, reticent to move and interrupt. It seemed kind of like a dream, honestly.

“Bwackie!” Liam cried once as he fell back onto the sofa cushion. Mickey leaned forward, poking him in the stomach, chuckling.

“It’s dark brown, you lil shithead.” He said, pulling at his own hair. “See?”

“Bwack! Bwack!” Liam was shrieking with laughter, which only seemed to egg Mickey on.

“Try this on for size— African American. Say that. Say African American.”

“Afwicam Amawufaba.” Liam said, trailing off. Mickey laughed, his voice dry and raspy. He poked the child in the stomach once more.

“Close enough, I guess.”

I would have watched the two for another hour if the front door hadn't opened at that moment. Fiona came in, cheeks slightly pinkened by the cool autumn wind. Carl was slouched over, and didn’t even ask when he saw Mickey on the couch. He trudged passed me and up the stairs without so much as a word.

Fiona, on the other hand, eyed the delinquent boy on the couch with the toddler with slightly more concern. Her eyes went from him to me. Mickey was staring at her, not even paying attention as Liam crawled onto his lap.

“Uh,” Fiona started, not sure where to actually begin.

“S’okay, Fi,” I said, dropping the last few steps and moving towards the couch. “Just having a, um…” I eyed Mickey, and then Liam. I grinned once more, helpless to do otherwise. “Just having a little playdate.”


End file.
